


Smooth Wine for an Aching Soul

by RainbowLotus



Category: Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six (Video Games)
Genre: Arguments, Dokkaebi wasn't being taken seriously, Drinking & Talking, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Français | French, French is only used a little bit, Girls' Night, Kissing, Post-Hammer and the Scalpel, Swearing, Twitch is a sweetheart, Wine, deep conversation, wholesome content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-28 15:21:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,539
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19396876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RainbowLotus/pseuds/RainbowLotus
Summary: Shortly following the short Hammer and the Scalpel, Dokkaebi is still feeling frustrated and doesn't know how to handle this predicament with Thatcher. So, she relies on a close friend, one who might be able to help her figure things out. Thankfully, Twitch has more than just sound advice.





	Smooth Wine for an Aching Soul

**Author's Note:**

> I always imagined Twitch being the type of woman lots of the Rainbow Six ladies go to for venting or just to have a nice time and hang out. So, this is kind of a little headcannon I have where Emmanuelle is essentially the peacemaker among Team Rainbow.

_It may take time, but you are nobody's nail. You're much too sharp for that._

Harry's words were etched into the back of Grace's head long after she had left his home to return to her daily happenings. She couldn't rid the feeling of irritation and the urge to do more than the great work she was already putting in. The fact that there were still many who haven't shown the slightest appreciation for her efforts ripped at every nerve throughout her body, and it caused her arms to shudder into light shakes and trembles as the Korean woman returned to her flat.

What else could she do? Grace had already significantly lowered the time it took to hack into devices, created phenomenal gadgets for her fellow operators, and spent countless hours improving on each thing she had made. So, why was it that there were still a handful, individuals like Thatcher, who doubted her abilities? As far as she was concerned, she was doing everything she should be doing. The others simply weren't giving her a chance.

Slamming the door behind her, Dokkaebi let out a frustrated groan and threw her keys onto the door side furniture. This was absolutely ridiculous, absurd, and a huge pain in her ass. From what it appeared, she wasn't getting any help from Six, and there was no way she was going to try and speak to Mike about the whole thing. The outcome of that was extremely transparent to her. It would only lead to some scolding, insults thrown from both ends, and it would create more tension than there currently was. What was she supposed to do?

Grace trudged over to her living room before allowing herself to fall backward into the soft cushioning of the sofa and she exhaled an audible breath while she gazed up at the ceiling. Was there anything she could do to make this whole problem disappear? It was like day after day the world wanted to torment Dokkaebi with hardships and hurdles, much more than the average individual would receive. Though, to be fair, she wasn't average. That was something that could be seen by everyone. Each operator that worked for Rainbow was beyond the average, did more than what most thought was necessary. It's what made each of them perfect for this line of work. But if that were really the case, why was she still fighting to prove herself for it? What was it the others had that she didn't? Why couldn't she get respect?

"It's not fair." The Korean muttered, her tone almost poisonous.

To try and get her mind off of recent events, Grace fished her phone out of her pocket and adventured through the internet. It was a good pass time for her, considering it had an endless source of a variety of media to browse. She found that her favorites included anything that contained inspiration for her next build, or perhaps sparked new ideas on how to repair old bugs and glitches. However, this time would probably be better spent not trying to surface those searches. She wouldn't want to rile herself up further thinking about improving her tech. Maybe a different activity would've been her best bet.

_Maybe I should talk to someone else._ Grace thought to herself and scrolled through her calendar. She kept record of which of her friends were either in the field for the time being or if they were available. Valkyrie was busy training with Blackbeard for one of their next operations, so she was out. Frost was visiting family. IQ was more than likely dealing with the German boys and their nonsense, but she might be able to come over. Caveira? Out of the question. She would only jab at whatever happened between her and Mike, if it were to be brought up. Lastly, she saw Twitch in her contacts. Grace had no clue what the French engineer was up to at the moment, but it didn't hurt to ask.

Dokkaebi tapped onto Emmanuelle's contact listing and called her cell phone. She held the device to her ear as the dial tone sounded followed by a few short rings. The woman counted how many times it rang. _1...2...3...4-_

The fourth ring was cut off, and both sides connected before Emmanuelle's voice could be heard.

"Salut, Grace." The engineer greeted kindly. Twitch was simply lying on her bed at home and watching a French comedy.

Dokkaebi smiled. "Hey Emma." It was a nickname that Grace preferred to use, which Twitch didn't mind. "Are you busy?"

"Not at all. I just got back from an op yesterday, so I'm taking a little break." Emmanuelle explained. "Why? Is everything alright?"

Even though it wasn't visible to the French operator, Grace had shrugged her shoulders and one hand rubbed the back of her neck. "I'm just having some problems with work the past couple of days. I was going to see if you wanted to hang out for a bit."

Emmanuelle nodded to herself and responded, "Of course." She then let out a soft giggle at a thought that had just occurred to her. "Better yet, I'll bring over something we'll both enjoy. It might help take the edge off."

Grace raised her eyebrows at the comment, but assumed it was probably food or something of the like. It was a typical thing for Emmanuelle to provide food and drinks whenever they hang out.

"Sounds good." The hacker beamed with delight shortly before they both hung up. Since she had a little while until Twitch would get to her flat, Grace decided that it would be a great idea to make sure she tidied up. There were a couple of stray, empty soda cans that she promptly crushed and put into a recycling bag to take out later. Afterwards, she took the last bit of time that remained to dust off a couple pieces of furniture in the living room and brought out her laptop to start working on some coding. It never did any harm to brush up on her C++ every once in a while when she wasn't too active in her work. 

Grace had spent approximately thirty minutes generating different types of codes, only to erase them and start over each time. It was really just typing practice to work on how quickly she could write the codes and move onto the next line. She was beginning to get super fast in her ability to type them up. One line, depending on the length, averaged almost three to four seconds. It was some progress that she was delighted to notice, and it lifted her spirit just in time for her friend to arrive. Just as she typed one last line, there was a gentle knock on the front door to her flat.

Dokkaebi glanced over her shoulder towards the door and called out, "The door is open!"

Emmanuelle turned the knob and entered, her head being the first thing to emerge from behind the door. Though, once she had fully come in and closed the door behind her, Grace caught a glance of a pink tinted glass bottle in the brunette's hand. There was a label on it, but it was facing away from where she currently sat. It caused the Korean to tilt her head in curiosity.

"Champagne?" Grace questioned, adjusting where her glasses rested on her nose. The French woman giggled and shook her head.

"Nope. Champagne is for celebration." Emmanuelle noted before turning the bottle to reveal the label. "It's wine."

Dokkaebi hummed at the remark that Twitch had given following her guess. "Then what is wine for?"

"Comfort and luxury." The brunette mused as she casually rummaged for two glasses in Grace's kitchen. She never had to ask at this point. The two of them were close enough with each other that they never were required to ask before doing something. They could just roll with whatever makes them feel at home. "You seem like you could use some when you were talking to me earlier." Emmanuelle admitted, fetching the two wine glasses and holding them between her fingers in one hand while she carried the pink bottle of wine in the other.

"Yeah..." Grace frowned a little as she turned to power on the TV that was up against the wall. Her body reached down to grab the remote from the nearby table. "You could say that."

She glanced to her side when Emmanuelle carefully set both glasses down on the coffee table in front of them, then the bottle of wine shortly after. Once the French operator knew all three fragil items were safely put on the table, she plopped down beside Dokkaebi before reaching over to open the wine bottle.

"What happened exactly?" Twitch asked. "Was it something with your teammate?"

"Chul Kyung Hwa?" Grace sounded a bit surprised by the assumption. "No, no. He's fine." She murmured, dismissing the idea that the problems were surfacing from her own unit. "It's between me and Mike."

Emmanuelle sighed. "What did he do this time."

_This time_. Dokkaebi pondered the statement. So, this wasn't the only time that Thatcher had pissed anybody off to an extent. It made her wonder who else had complained about him, though it wasn't any of her business. Apparently it wasn't the first time Twitch has heard these complaints either. Perhaps she would know how to handle it then, considering she's had some experience talking about this particular operator.

"He-" Grace cut herself off by thanking Emmanuelle when she handed her a half full glass of the pink wine, and she swirled the liquid in the glass before she continued. "He doesn't let me prove myself. Our last simulation, he wouldn't give me a chance to hack the cameras, and he refused to acknowledge that I had a good plan."

Twitch took a moment to process what was being said, but she did give a response fairly soon after the Korean had given her brief explanation. "Well... how much time did you have left?"

"Thirty seconds." Dokkaebi answered nonchalantly. "We had plenty of time. I could have given us eyes in the room, and we would have been in the clear."

"And what did Mike do?" Emmanuelle asked calmly, despite Grace getting riled up.

The hacker took a quick sip of the alcoholic beverage, letting the taste linger before she spoke up once more. "He just threw in an EMP." Her eyes stared at the slightly bitter but sweet drink as a frown remained in her lips. "And he taunted me afterward. Said, _Don't worry about it, you'll get it next time_." She taunted the way he spoke, explaining the situation and it was clearly written all over her facial features that she was distraught about the whole thing. "I went to talk to Six...I like him and all, but I don't really think his advice helped."

Twitch gave a gentle smile and reached a hand up to rub her shoulder. "I think he's just used to the way things were before. Before now, a lot of operations were only run with the old equipment we had. There weren't any specialists for hacking into cameras or people who engineer recon drones." She took her hand off to take a sip of her own drink. "Mike might still be adjusting to it all. It took him a while to come around for me, it might be the same for you."

Grace looked at her with confusion. "Thatcher didn't like you?"

Emmanuelle chuckled, "Not at first. He thought the idea of shock drones and new technology was ridiculous." She had a rather goofy grin as she looked back on it. "But after seeing in action when he _wasn't_ in some of our simulations did help push his old thoughts out of the way. He started seeing the new tech as a good thing and he stopped bugging me as much about it."

The black haired woman hummed softly at the new information she had received. "But...he still bugs you, doesn't he?"

Twitch exhaled a gentle breath and nudged her friend to take another sip and relax a little as she formed a response. "Not everyone will be completely happy with your work, Grace. Not every co-worker we have will appreciate what you do, but that doesn't mean that everyone doesn't. You have to be able to accept that some peoples' views won't change right away, if ever. You have to be happy with yourself and the work you put in for it to be worth while." She leaned back into the couch, tipping her glass back to take in a larger sip of the bitter-sweet wine, and gave a delightful grin at the warm, bubbly sensation it gave her. "Grace, I know Thatcher doesn't seem to appreciate your _gadgets_ now, but trust me when I say he does appreciate your work. He appreciates everyone's work. He can just be a bit rough around the edges."

Grace scoffed in slight amusement. "More like rough everywhere." She giggled when Emmanuelle playfully flicked her arm.

"Just relax and look after yourself, mon ami." The French operator spoke with compassion laced in her tone of voice. "If you don't give yourself a little 'me' time, then you'll start overworking yourself and become broken down."

Dokkaebi gazed down at the glass of rosy pink liquid, seeing her reflection staring back at her. "Thank you, Emmanuelle. I really appreciate it."

The brunette smiled kindly before carefully leaning over and planted a soft kiss onto the Korean's cheek. The interaction caused Grace's skin to bloom with a red warmth and she could feel a shiver of shock down her spine.

"Mike will come around. Trust me."

The raven haired Korean set her glass down onto the coffee table and shifted a bit closer to Emmanuelle, snuggling up into her as the French woman wrapped an arm over her shoulder. She could faintly hear each breath she took and the feeling of warmth along her left side was now incredibly apparent now that her body was making direct contact with Twitch's. Grace hadn't realized how comforting it was to have someone really understand her predicament, and show compassion, empathy, and have a genuine connection. It wasn't like Six didn't understand, but Harry wasn't quite on an even playing field as Emmanuelle was. Her friend knew her inside and out and could read her like the back of her hand. Meanwhile, Harry had only recently began to scratch the surface.

"I know he will." Grace reached her right hand to rest on Emmanuelle's left that rested on her own thigh. She then intertwined their fingers and she gave an affectionate squeeze.

Who knew good company and some bitter wine was all Dokkaebi needed. If it weren't for Emmanuelle, she probably would have been throwing her fit and wishing things would change out of the blue. Now, she knew better, and while it wasn't quite the answer she wanted, Grace was just glad she had someone who could really see where she was coming from, and have a deep connection with.

Things would improve. All she needed was time.


End file.
